MEChA Should Be Allowed at School

* Community activists who have been urging the Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District to reinstate a chapter of Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan (MEChA) at Esperanza High School deserve our support as students (“School to Continue Restrictions on Clubs,” April 18).

The board of trustees has said that MEChA does not qualify because of the closed forum policy which prohibits all clubs except those that are directly related to the curriculum. But the policy also states that the district could have chosen to allow club status to all student organizations. Perhaps it is time for a change. When the students speak out and express their desires and need for a club which gives them a way of involvement in their school, not on the streets in gangs, then the district should listen.

The district officials state that they chose to allow only clubs related to the curriculum versus club status to all student organizations in an effort to head off neo-Nazi and other controversial groups forming on campuses. However, they are not taking into account what is happening to these Latino students who would like to identify with a positive group, and the help it might give in keeping kids out of gangs and trouble. This would also help to keep kids in school to finish their education and graduate, rather than giving up and staying home or on the streets.

MEChA has existed in the past with a positive outcome and should be allowed to re-establish in any school where there is an interest.

KURTIS SHERMAN

Laguna Niguel